Gulf Coast Waste Disposal in Salt Caverns

In addition to isolation from the surface environment, the product is prevented from anypost closure movement within the salt formation. Although movement within mostporous media may be considered small or insignificant, movement of fluids containinghigh solids contents may be considerable in caprock or other under-pressured formations.This movement may be such that the product could move out of the zone under thecontrol of the operator resulting in non-compliance of permit conditions or potential legalaction from adjacent property owners.Existing and Proposed Gulf Coast ProjectsThe gulf coast area for the purposes of this paper extends from the Yucatan Peninsula inMexico to the western coastline of the state of Florida in the US. The existing andproposed projects discussed herein are all in the United States. Mexico will be discussedlater in the paper.The one existing and operational project discussed herein is located in the state of Texasapproximately mid-way between Houston and Beaumont, Texas. See Figure 1The cavern that is located on the site was originally developed as a brine well to supplysaturated brine to a sulfur mining operation as part of the Frasch Process used in themining. The cavern was initially drilled in 1968 and was mined for over 10 years. Thereis no information available on the circulation rates during this time period since the minewas closed down and dismantled in the 1980s time period and the records have not beenretained. The cavern was re-entered with a new well and sonared to determine itsvolumetric capacity. The sonar indicated a volume of 6.2 million standard barrels. Thecavern size and shape is shown on Figure 2.